Oh dear, 'Fake' Manuka Honey in the headlines

In today's New Zealand Herald on Sunday there is a story about fake manuka honey being sold around the world - http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11113964. There is a similar story in the UK' Sunday Times.

One of the behind the scenes issues is that not all of the beekeepers and producers can agree on a set standard for manuka honey, or a definition for what should be able to be labelled as 'manuka'. Of course you will never be able to get all of them to agree, as with the demand and associated premium pricing for manuka there is money to be made by some in selling as low a quality product as possible.

Part of the issue applies to all types of honey - what should constitute a proper mono-floral product. After all the bees will always end up visiting a variety of flowers in the area even if there happens to be predominantly one type at the time.

Concentrating on the percentage of a single floral source however does not address the main concern from the consumers perspective when it comes to manuka.

The premium reputation that has come about for manuka honey is based around various scientific research showing benefits from a unique non-peroxide activity that some manuka has, and which is additional to the common peroxide activity found in all honeys (and that the peroxide activity is not stable).

So consumers have become educated to expect that they are receiving this special non-peroxide activity when buying a jar of manuka honey. Problem has become that with limited supply of honey containing this, many brands have instead supplied honey with none of the non-peroxide activity, instead labelling it based on a supposed level of common peroxide activity but failed to be clear to consumers on the difference.

It should be pointed out that while inevitably there are some New Zealand parties involved in this, it is not solely a New Zealand issue. Equally whether in the UK or other countries there are the local companies and brands involved.

Whilst these current headlines do not make pretty reading, hopefully in the interests of consumers around the world it will convince the appropriate authorities to more closely investigate and take action against those companies (in the UK or anywhere else) that have been misleading people.

The good companies have been trying to lead on this issue for some time, and this publicity of the issues should enable them to compete more fairly, and allow greater clarity to consumers on just which products do contain the unique non-peroxide activity.